Teen charged in connection with bar owner's homicide to be tried as adult

MANSFIELD — The teenager accused of the fatal shooting of bar owner Thomas Belcher will be tried as an adult.

Caleb Sampsel has been charged with aggravated murder, aggravated burglary and gross abuse of a corpse — all with gun specifications — for the shooting on Aug. 28, 2016. He was arrested almost two years later.

The teen was before Richland County Juvenile Court Judge Ron Spon on Friday for a bindover hearing to determine whether he would be tried as an adult. Spon announced his decision several hours after the hearing.

The suspect's mother told her son to call Loughman, who said the recording was downloaded to a computer but was not yet on a disc, so it could not be played for the court.

Loughman said the suspect asked if he could plead and remain in juvenile prison and avoid adult prison.

Detective Dave Scheurer was one of the first people on the scene of the homicide.

"You could see blood on the threshold," he said on the witness stand.

Scheurer said Belcher's body was found in a hallway leading to the bathroom. Police recovered "15 or 16" shell casings.

The detective said a Lee Enfield rifle with a scope was taken from the bedroom wall.

"There were different people we suspected were involved," Scheurer said.

He interviewed one of those men, who told him where the rifle was. Police searched the Cline Avenue residence of Bakari Young II in April 2017 and recovered the rifle. Young was charged with receiving stolen property and sentenced to three years probation.

On cross examination, Hitchman asked about family members who were on the scene before police and whether they could have contaminated the crime scene.

The final witness was a woman, whom Spon asked a reporter not to identify. She said the suspect pounded on her door in the early morning of Aug. 28, 2016.

She said the teen wore a white T-shirt that had blood on it.

"He said he got in a fight with an older guy," the witness said.

The woman said she told the suspect to go upstairs and lie down. She said she saw the imprint of a gun on the teen's side but did not see a gun.

She called the teen's mother.

On cross-examination, Hitchman asked the witness how she knew it was Aug. 28. The woman said she always looks at the calendar and had a doctor's appointment later that day.

The witness also said the suspect said he was leaving to get rid of a gun, then returned before his mother picked him up.

In his closing, Assistant Prosecutor Brandon Pigg said there was plenty of evidence for probable cause, citing the phone calls in which he said the suspect admitted being at the crime scene and firing at least one shot.